BUSINESS COMMUNITY & WAR

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2247, 5 September 1914, Page 8

BUSINESS COMMUNITY & WAR

HOW THE SITUATION SHOULD BE MET AN APPEAL TO COMMON SENSE Tho following sensible article which appeared m the Sydney "Daily Telegraph last week applies with equal iorce to New Zealand;— Lord Ivitohener appears to contemplate the possibility of tho. war lasting tor three years or more. That is put lorward as an extreme supposition, hut actual -provision is being made to carry it on for at least a period of six months'. Of course.neither Lord Kitchener nor ■anyone else can tell when it will end. It is a war without precedent, and it may break down by its own deadweight in a few weeks' time, or it may continue in one form or other for months or even years. Ju the meantime, with the world at war, how axe the people going to live?- Each •( country must answer that question for itself, and in I ' ! L oW V vay - la this respect Australia «»/tters from none of the others. It is ior ourselves to so've the problem as it affects ourselves. And tho time' is pretty near when the business community here must pull itself together and set seriously about readjusting its affairs to the altered position. When tho first shock of the war was felt the ottect upon trade was necessarily- stunning to a, greater or lesser degree. This cannot be allowed to last. ,We have suspended wool sales and other businesses, shut up tho Stock Exchange and gone into financial mourning, but tor howJong? Suppose tho war lasts U months, .or even six months? Is the community to stand all that time idly wringing its hands and adding up the list of casualties, true ornntruo, that ifu S ? n \v m from tfre various battlohelds ? We are here in a land of plenty, within thousands of miles of which not a shot is likely to be'-fired. The war has not destroyed one penny's worth of ■property in Australia, nor is there any j-.visible-,probability that it will do so. Ino destruction that is being wreaked mil cause an increased demand for Australian products at other people's expense when tho damage has to be mado good, '• The stoppage of regular sales lest prices should fall and people be ruined by the slump is much on a par with the policy of the ostrich, which puts its head in the sand and thinks that danger- unseen is danger avc-rted. 'Prices have gone down in spite of that stoppage. - Wherever their new level may be thoy will find it, if not in the regular ■way of business, in an. irregular way. And at that level trade must eooner or. later accommodate- itself. Some articles have _ been enhanced in price by war conditions, others have been depreciated'. And money has to take its chance in tho market the same as everything else. Whether interest rates are up or down they .must be paid, or the enterprises which depend ; on financial accommodation will cease. And unemployed capital can suffer as well as unemployed- labour. The owner of sovereigns cannot live upon them, he can only live on the things they aro exchangeable for. There is no doubt that we aro faced by new conditions which effect both labour and capital. The duration of these conditions may ■ belong or it may be short; but it would never do to suspend business and wait till matters became normal again. That would be the way to'prevent them from becoming normal. People here require just as much to eat and to wear ae tfiey <Jid before' the war. They havo tho samo necessity for reasonable recreations and the same-appreciation of tho comforts and : decencies of life. The natural sources from which these are supplied havo not been interfered with. We have no ruined railways to reconstruct, no battered down cities to rebuild, no crops burned up, no stores pillaged by invading armies. Nor are our taxpayers called upqn to pay a cash indemnity, as those of France were in 1871, after the wholesale ruin' wrought, first by a foreign foe, and next by tho Communo. As a ■ matter of. fact there is no. wreckage of any kind to make-good, and if the people are called upon to lend any money to the Government, it' will be to spend on reproductive works for their own benefit. To bring the ordinary business of the country 'to a standstill, and, in face of these- facts, to let it remain in that state, would mean that the capacity for self-help ha'd 'been frightened completely out of the people. And that would involve tho further supposition that they were not the same people as the race from which they sprang. So far as tho duration of the war is concerned nothing that this community can do will have .much, effect in prolonging it or in shortening it. Wβ are not in_a position even to know how it is being waged, or over which banners the birds of good or bad omen are at any given, moment hovering. Our wisdom regarding what is being done by thoso in whom we trust to bring it to a successful issue for the Allies is that which only comes after the event. But so far thero has been nothing to justify any misgivings regarding the ultimato outcome. The campaign is developing just as it, was expected, and quite as well as it was over hoped to develop. All it has to do is to go on as it is doing, and the success of the Allies is , not only assured, but we may confidently expect that it will bo accomplished speedily. Speedily, however, does not moan in a day or. a week, or a month. To defeat four million highly-trained German soldiers in that space- of time would menu that it was accomplished miraculously. And if we- stand .idly waiting for a miraclo of that kind wo will simply oourt tho disappointment that such I puerile tactics would deserve. The sensible- policy is to resume all ordinary business operations that havo been suspended, wholly or partially, through the war, and allow matters to settle themselves, down to the altered financial and commercial levels that may, for all wo know, oxist for years to conic. In this way wo can best help ourselves, and also help the Empire, by keeping in » position to carry our share of the war dmrissi ■■:■■